A ramble and a cup of joe.

So I'm sitting in Starbucks behind a young man and woman conversing... And their dynamic is warm and beautiful and fresh- they are talking openly and freely, getting serious, then laughing... I sense love is in the air! You might think I'm a creeper for listening in on strangers, but, if you've read my other blogs, you'd know how much I love analyzing strangers.

Sometimes strangers tell you more about yourself and who you want to be more than someone you've known for years. Just the way they represent themselves makes you look at the way you represent your own self. Are you friendly? Open? Grumpy? Talkative? Annoying? Charismatic? Shy?

Those first 5 seconds of meeting someone is sometimes a moment you remember for a long time-- despite the thing they regret saying yesterday, despite the pain they are still getting over, despite the baggage you can't shrug off.


"My history doesn't look good" he says, "Mine doesn't either" she replies.


They laugh, and move on, and enjoy each other's company despite the stories they just shared with each other, revealing their rocky past.


And now they share their little quirks, and you can tell they find each other endearing because of them.


Friends, THIS is what a normal date, get together, or any kind of social experience should look like.

I feel like we are lacking this today.


Why is the act of deep conversation a thing of the past?

Why can't we take the time to dive deep into each other's minds, with walls down, and hearts open, respecting each other and showing each other you are important?


This is something I need to work on too. It's a lot easier to stay in my own mind than try to share the craziness within my brain (cause let me tell ya, it's pretty cray cray in there). Sometimes I'm with my fiancé, and fail to partake in the deep conversation we need because I'm too occupied with my phone or other illegitimate things.


I want us- myself and my loved ones, this generation, this world- to have this same level of social intimacy as these strangers in Starbucks do.


Intimacy gets a bad rap. People either understand it as a concept of sex, or just as something incredibly uncomfortable. Because sometimes being intimate with someone- showing your heart and soul-- that really is uncomfortable. But once you knock down those walls and get past the initial uncomfortable feeling, you realize the value of intimacy. You realize that is the foundation to real friendships and real love.


Yall, let's be REAL with each other. These roles we think we need to put ourselves in are often an unnecessary detour from our destiny. Let's be intimate, let's show our hearts, let's treat our neighbors like we would want to be treated, and love each other through our messes.


Messes can be really beautiful sometimes.


Back to my cappuccino I go.

Heart-wrenching, bone-trembling change.

I've been sort of MIA this summer.

I'll be honest with what my main task was: I was watching sitcoms.

Friends and How I Met Your Mother to be exact.

And I sort of felt bad about it because I never wanted to be that girl who wastes her life sitting around watching Netflix all day, but now that I've finished all 10 seasons of Friends and all 9 seasons of HIMYM, I think I know why I got so attached to these shows.

The premise of both of these shows is this journey of growing up, destiny, and change-- sometimes heart wrenching, bone trembling change.

And even though its just sappy TV... they've got some truth to em.

Because I'm there.

Right now I have a book titled Things I Wish I'd Known Before We Got Married sitting beside me. I have a beautiful diamond ring on my left hand. In 2 weeks, I'll move to the start of finishing up my last year living on campus at college before I become a married woman.

I'm so incredibly excited for whats ahead because everything that I want, everything that I know is my destiny, is finally being fulfilled...
But right now its bittersweet. I'm not blind to the heart wrenching, bone trembling change that is ahead of me. I know that I'm walking into a difficult path but I know its one that I truly want to take.

For so long, I've hated my youth. Thats such a strange thing to say, but I have. I wanted to make adult decisions even when I didn't know what adult decisions were. I've been really naive in thinking that. I wanted to be a grown-up and deal with grown-up stuff because as long as I can remember, the piddly adolescent stuff has got on my nerves. I've never been the party girl, never been the girl that dated around, always wanted to make mature decisions and always wanted to be smart. Yeah, I had my teenage girl moments. But after I started high school, I really did want to morph into a mature woman.

It took heartbreak, lost friendships, losing my mind, and finally refocusing my perspective to change me into who I am today. And really, this blog was started when I finally felt like I was becoming who I really wanted to be.

In 280 days, I'm totally pushing adolescence behind me.

I'm over my head in wedding planning and this week, I got really discouraged. Not because of the stress of wedding planning necessarily (although it is pretty stressful trying to find an affordable venue), but because I know I'm putting so much time and thought into something that is a symbol of a brand new chapter of my life--- no, a brand new book.
I know the setting will change. The theme will change. The vibe will change. And I'm afraid that the characters will change.

I've dealt with this heart wrenching, bone trembling change so many times in my life. But most of it was change that came as a slow fade. Right now, its something looming ahead.

Its scary, but also really exciting. I could also say that its exciting, but also really scary (haha).

If theres one thing that I've received from this summer of wasting my life watching sitcoms, its that it doesn't matter how the place changes, but how the people change.
I mean, come on... the moment Monica and Chandler closed their apartment door, it wasn't a sad moment because of the fact that they had to leave the apartment, but for the fact that they had changed so much and their circumstances had changed so much, that they had to leave the past behind.

And Ted met his kids' mother only through a system of change in himself. Had he not experienced the people that he did, he probably never would have found her.

In the same way, had I not been surrounded by the beautiful people in my life, I would not have found my sweet man, who I am so excited to marry. I only found him because my family and my friends, and even people who I didn't know, and even people who hurt me... they all taught me what to look for in a man, but more importantly, what to BE before I found a man.

For so long I thought that God wouldn't send me my husband until I had gone through college, and experienced the real world by myself. I thought I needed to be taught total independence to be able to be a good wife and a good citizen and a good person.

But finding my sweet man has brought about a heart wrenching, bone trembling change in me, because I know now that I need to be taught interdependence. I can become better by experiencing even more heart wrenching, bone trembling change with the man of my dreams by my side.

In the past 2 years, I've learned that people are better than places. And it doesn't matter where God takes me, or what heart wrenching, bone trembling change He puts me through... He will always have the perfect people to be there to pull me out of myself, and point me to my destiny.